The 22-year-old former Newcastle United striker sprinted down a waiting area outside court with arms outstretched.

He also banged the glass dock with his hands when the jury delivered their verdict after just an hour and 10 minutes of deliberation and said: “Thank God for that."

Ranger, in a black jumper, white shirt and black trousers, beamed and pulled off his tie saying ‘yes, yes’ before thanking jurors as he made his way out of the dock.

But he said: “What a joke” near the public gallery at Newcastle crown court, a barbed comment aimed at the prosecution case against him.

Members of the public looked on in astonishment as the 6’2’’ tall striker ran outside the court room with his arms outstretched.

He then beamed for photographers as he left the court building on Newcastle Quayside.

Ranger declined to make any further comment on the verdict, but his solicitor Geoffrey Forrester said: “Having considered all the evidence in a trial that lasted over six days, it took the jury just over an hour to reach a unanimous verdict that he was not guilty.

“He now wants to resume his career and move forward with his life.”

The trial heard the alleged victim contacted police after meeting Ranger for a night out in February last year.

She claimed that she had not consented to sex after Ranger booked them into a room in the Carlton Hotel, in Jesmond, Newcastle.

Giving evidence, the woman said that she had no memory of the night after the first bar they were in until she woke up naked next to Ranger in bed.

She said Ranger told her she should take the morning after pill.

She left and they continued to swap messages that day.

In the five days before the alleged offence, they exchanged a total of 1,060 texts, in which she described him as “Nile Ripper”, a “predator” and an “animal”.